Interesting Items / National Security

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Afghan forces were still battling the Taliban in parts of Ghazni on Saturday, a day after the insurgents launched a multi-pronged assault on the eastern city. Interior Ministry spokesman Najib Danish said at least 25...

UTICA, N.Y. (AP) — President Donald Trump on Monday dared New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo to challenge him in 2020 — and warned the Democrat, "Anybody that runs against Trump suffers." Trump also said that Cuomo once called him and promised that he...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Pointing to growing threats and competition from Russia and China, the White House on Thursday announced ambitious plans to create the U.S. Space Force as a sixth, separate military warfighting service by 2020. The proposal taps...

JERUSALEM (AP) — Gaza's Hamas rulers said late Thursday that a truce had been reached with Israel, ending an intense two-day burst of violence that had pushed the region closer to war. But the deal did not appear to address the deeper issues that h...

The U.S. Army has stopped discharging immigrant recruits who enlisted seeking a path to citizenship — at least temporarily. A memo shared with The Associated Press spells out orders to high-ranking Army officials to stop processing discharges of...

SANAA, Yemen (AP) — Yemen's Shiite rebels on Friday backed a U.N. call for a probe into a Saudi-led coalition airstrike in the country's north that killed dozens of people the previous day, including many children, in an attack that drew wide...

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — A brazen and bloody overnight assault Friday by the Taliban on a key provincial capital in central Afghanistan has increased pressure on U.S.-backed Afghan forces that are withering under relentless attacks, prompting Pres...

JERUSALEM (AP) — Violence erupted at the Gaza border Friday after the territory's militant Islamic Hamas rulers and Israel appeared to be honoring a cease-fire that ended two days of intense violence amid efforts by neighboring Egypt to negotiate...

WASHINGTON (AP) — An Iranian naval exercise involving at least 100 small boats in and around the Strait of Hormuz last week was meant as a message to the U.S. for re-imposing economic sanctions on Tehran, the top U.S. commander in the Middle East...

Move over, Mother Nature. First-time moms at low risk of complications were less likely to need a cesarean delivery if labor was induced at 39 weeks instead of waiting for it to start on its own, a big study found. Their babies fared better, too....

WASHINGTON (AP) — The United States announced Wednesday it will impose new sanctions on Russia for illegally using a chemical weapon in an attempt to kill a former spy and his daughter in Britain earlier this year. The new sanctions, to be imposed...

FUKUYAMA, Japan (AP) — It's a sunny summer morning in the city of Hiroshima, Japan. Cicadas chirp in the trees. A lone plane flies high overhead. Then a flash of light, followed by a loud blast. Buildings are flattened and smoke rises from...

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — As Iranians awoke Tuesday to renewed U.S. sanctions that had been lifted by Tehran's nuclear deal with world powers, the question on everyone's mind remained: What happens now? From deciphering President Donald Trump's tweets...

(The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.) Andrea Oelsner, Universidad de San Andrés (Argentina) and Federico Merke, Universidad de San Andrés (Argentina) (THE CONVERSATION)...

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump wants a Space Force, a new military service he says is needed to ensure American dominance in space. But the idea is gaining little traction at the Pentagon, where the president's defense chief, Jim Mattis,...

SINGAPORE (AP) — Roller-coaster nuclear diplomacy between the United States and North Korea hit highs and lows on Saturday as the countries' top diplomats traded polite words and barbs, leaving efforts to rid the North of its atomic weapons at an...

WASHINGTON (AP) — As the Trump administration readies to re-impose sanctions on Iran that were lifted under the 2015 nuclear accord, America's European allies fear greater regional instability. President Donald Trump's withdrawal from the landmark...

NISKAYUNA, N.Y. (AP) — The lawyer for a General Electric engineer charged with stealing digital files says there's no evidence his client colluded with the Chinese government or sold secrets on the company's turbine technology. The U.S. attorney's...

BEIRUT (AP) — U.N. peacekeepers returned Thursday for the first time in years to the frontier between Syria and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, conducting joint patrols with Russian military police in a reflection of Moscow's deepening role in...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House said Thursday that President Donald Trump received a new letter from North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and responded quickly with a letter of his own. The correspondence, following up on their Singapore summit, came...

BEIRUT (AP) — For nearly three years, green buses have filed into Syria's Idlib province, bringing those evacuated from other opposition enclaves that fell to government forces — thousands of defeated rebel fighters, wanted activists and...

SINGAPORE (AP) — Secretary of State Mike Pompeo says that while there's "still a ways to go," the United States remains "confident" in North Korea's commitment to denuclearize. Pompeo is attending an Asian security forum with North Korea's foreign...

HONOLULU (AP) — In an emotional and solemn ceremony, the remains of dozens of presumed casualties from the Korean War were escorted by military honor guards onto U.S. soil on Wednesday, 65 years after an armistice ended the conflict and weeks...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Under the gun to increase the size of the force, the Army is issuing more waivers for past drug use or bad conduct by recruits, and pouring an extra $200 million into bonuses this year to attract and retain soldiers. According to...

NEW YORK (AP) — The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is creating a center aimed at protecting banks, electric companies and other critical infrastructure against cyberattacks — a threat that now exceeds the danger of a physical attack...